The Plank nobility

In the 16th and 17th centuries, the lumber trade and sawmill operations were dominated by lords, county governors and other central officials - both nobles and commoners - who operated on behalf of the King, but who also had private interests in this profitable trade.

By the 18th century, the Crown had withdrawn from this industry entirely, and the role of the civil servants had been taken over by merchants, who were largely bourgeois on Bragernes or Strømsø. This was the new upper class, known as the "merchant patriciate" or "plankeadel".

In the mid-18th century, the sawmill industry was completely dominated by a handful of families, who had largely intermarried with each other – Cudrio, Smith, Stranger, Wiel, Arbo, Cappelen and Hofgaard. The latter two had particular connections to Eiker – Cappelen as owner of Fossesholmgodset and Hofgaard as owner of the sawmills at Hoen and in Mjøndalen. But the others also owned and leased sawmills both in Eiker and in other villages.

Several of them were also involved in the timber trade, but there were also several smaller players involved.

With a luxurious lifestyle and high luxury consumption, this upper class also led the way in cultural developments, from clothing fashions to ornamental objects made of silver and glass or exotic consumer goods such as tobacco, sugar, coffee, tea, wine and spirits.

These became consumer goods that the wider population also tried to acquire to the best of their ability – and which led parish priest Hans Strøm to chastise the Eikværingen for their excessive penchant for luxury in his "Physical-Oeconomistic Description of Eger Præstegield".